Adam Weinstein

The Heritage Foundation hates hates hates government tyranny in your life. That's why it endorses a new "bipartisan" congressional bill to make sure you gays know your goddamn place.

Heritage, the fount of conservative thought led by retired senator and tea party commando Jim DeMint, most recently made news for commissioning an immigration study from a researcher who thinks minorities are dum-dums and low-IQ immigrants should be prevented from fouling America's pristine shores. But late Friday, Heritage found a new losing crusade: new legislation to make sure homophobic states can keep on keepin' on.

The think tank's blog trumpeted HR 3829, the "State Marriage Defense Act of 2014," which defines would prevent Uncle Sam from recognizing gay marriages in states that explicitly ban them. This became an issue in recent weeks, after a federal court overturned Utah's same-sex marriage ban and the state's government offices were inundated with 1,300 gay and lesbian couples exchanging nuptials. Utah is refusing to recognize the unions as valid; Attorney General Eric Holder, however, announced Friday that the federal government would accept the marriages.

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The nerve! Such overreach! "[A]ll Americans should insist our laws embody the truth about marriage," Heritage's blog announces. "And the federal government should respect it when state laws do so."

Goodness! Who will protect these poor outmatched defenders of the natural order, like Alabama and Mississippi and Arkansas, from this unconscionable federal aggression against states' rights? Nothing like this has ever happened before.

By "bipartisan," they must mean that the bill's supporters like both kinds of music—country and western. Here is a list of the bill's 27 co-sponsors. They represent a broad swath of American viewpoints—from Texas conservatives to Florida conservatives. Nearly one-third of them hail from states that weren't members of the Confederacy. They represent the right wing of the Republican Party and the far-right wing of the Republican Party. But they include no Democrats. No independents. No socialists or Greens or LaRouchies.

On the plus side, even if HR 3829 passes, you can have your gay wedding and reception right by the Heritage Foundation's headquarters, since it's in gay-friendly Washington. That's 214 Massachusetts Avenue NE. Save the date!